


Who do we appreciate?

by Solshine



Category: Ocean's (Movies), ocean’s 8
Genre: F/F, gimme suggestions I’m so serious, oneshots, shippy or not
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-28
Updated: 2018-06-28
Packaged: 2019-05-30 02:50:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,217
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15087377
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Solshine/pseuds/Solshine
Summary: Where I’m putting any O8 oneshots I write because I’m taking it as a challenge to write any ship combination my friends can come up with.1: An actress walks into a pool hall.2: Rose has a surprise for Amita. And a crush on her. Both of these things.3: If Constance wants to teach her how to toss three card Monte, who is Nineball to say no?4: There's an extremely sexy brunette that comes into Lou's club and never dances. Lou takes that as a challenge.





	1. Nineball/Daphne

Daphne saunters in the door in tight designer jeans and a lace bra peeking through the strategically ripped neckline of her vintage-look Stones tee, and Nineball rolls her eyes. It’s like something from a Vogue covershoot with a “dive bar” theme. The outfit probably costs more than the pro-grade pool table Nineball’s shooting on, and that’s without the shoes.

The corner of Daphne’s lips twitch up when she sees Nineball looking, and she crosses the room toward her with more sway in her hips than is strictly necessary. A third of the people in the room clearly recognize her, and another third are clearly trying to convince themselves they don’t. Because 9ball’s is a classy hole, sure, but not that classy.

“You here to make a scene?” Nineball asks, raising one eyebrow. Daphne raises both back, a mask of innocence.

“Why?” she says. “Were you hoping for one? I could have someone run over a headshot to sign, you could put it on the wall.”

Nineball snorts. “Not a chance. You’re going to ruin this place’s reputation just by being here.”

Daphne takes a pool cue off the wall. “They’ll be cool,” she says, gesturing with one hand at the bar at large. She turns half around towards the other patrons, who are all looking at the two of them now, and gestures again. “You guys will be cool, right?” It’s half letting them in on a friendly secret, and half a challenge. Playing the role of someone you don’t want to disappoint. 

To Nineball’s faint surprise, many of them nod, and most of them turn deliberately back to their drinks and conversations.

Daphne turns back around and smiles at her. “They’ll be cool,” she says. Nineball has to laugh.

“That’s not gonna stop em going straight to a tabloid,” she mutters as she hands Daphne the chalk. She passes it from her palm to Daphne’s, their hands sliding against each other, warm and smooth.

“You’d be surprised,” Daphne murmurs back. “I had a great deli on the down-low for like, a month. Ruined it myself in the end by not shaking a paparazzo tail.”

Nineball laughs again. This woman handles people the way Nineball can handle a mainframe, and she can’t help but be impressed.

Obviously handling a mainframe is harder. But, you know, it takes all kinds to make the diamonds go round.

Daphne folds her hands over the end of her cue and watches Nineball clear up the table, ball by ball, and it occurs to her that if Daphne could keep from being recognized, she’d probably be great at hustling pool.

It further occurs to her, glimpsing the ghost of a smirk on Daphne’s fire engine lips, that she might be about to prove that. Nineball might even let her.

She racks the balls again under Daphne’s hooded gaze.

“Shall we make this interesting?” Daphne says. There it is.

“You may have noticed,” Nineball answers, “I have enough money.”

Daphne keeps staring steadily at her, only breaking eye contact to drag her eyes deliberately down Nineball’s body and up again.

“Money isn’t interesting,” Daphne says.

Nineball feels herself start to grin.


	2. Rose/Amita

The silver bell on the door rings, and Rose hears her girl greeting the guest. She hardly registers the sound, however, until a warm voice answers “I’m here to see Rose, actually. She said I should come by as soon as—”

Rose keeps herself from crashing through the door, but just barely.

“Amita, darling!” she exclaims. “I didn’t expect you back so soon. How was Italy?” As if Rose hasn’t had one eye on Amita’s instagram for weeks.

“Delicious,” Amita giggles. She’s wearing some soft, fluttering blouse she must have bought in Italy. It looks amazing on her, and Rose feels absurdly jealous of the designer, whoever they are. “Should I come back another time, though?”

“No!” Rose said hurriedly. “No, of course not, I’m not busy or I’d be upstairs. Come come come, I’ve been bursting to show you.”

“What is it?” Amita asks, eyes sparkling, as they step into the elevator. “You’ve got me so curious by now. Is it a dress? I mean, for me? Or, oh! Is it your fall line already?”

Rose shakes her head, but doesn’t answer at first, more nervous than she really should be. Amita is smiling at her. Her mouth is painted the color of pinot noir and it’s making Rose thirsty. 

She tugs on the fingers of her left hand, one by one, until a knuckle pops. She clears her throat.

“You still don’t have a studio in New York, right?” Rose says abruptly, just before the elevator doors open. Amita steps out and goes up to a piece pinned onto a dress form, making admiring noises.

“A studio?” she says distractedly, circling the dress. “Like a shop? Nah. I do kind of miss designing, but I haven’t unpacked my old workbench. There always seems to be better things to do.”

Her old workbench? Shit, Rose didn’t even think of that. She’d been pretty particular about the station they’d set up for her in the bathroom, hadn’t she? 

She’s moving on to the next dress form, exclaiming over something Rose has done with the sleeves. She’s heading toward the east window and is going to see it anyway and Rose is going to run out of time to explain herself—

“Well, till you do, you can always come here,” she says, and good, yes, that sounded casual. Cool. Except the setup by the window is not particularly casual, and now Amita’s looking at her.

“Here?” she says. Rose glances over to the window, as if to check that everything’s still there. Amita follows her gaze.

She gasps when she sees the jeweler’s studio in the corner, which is ambiguous, and then runs over to it laughing, which is probably good.

It’s state of the art, of course, Everything brand new, except in places where new isn’t necessarily better. The green dyed marble from the soldering table is antique, reclaimed from the demolition of some French villa or another. It has character, is the point.

“Rose, this is beautiful! Oh, I’d love to give some of this stuff a try.“

Rose bounces happily on her toes a bit. “There are raw materials in the safe there. I’ll give you the combination.”

The early afternoon sun glints in Amita’s shining black hair as she turns and looks at the open plan design studio around them.

“But this is where you work. I wouldn’t be in your way?“

Rose frowns. “Well, of course not,” she says. “We work well together. Don’t you think? I thought so.” She starts to tug on a finger again.

Amita’s answering grin, however, is broad and beaming. “I thought so too,“ she says with a dimple. She turns back to the workbench, picking up a small mallet and testing its feel in her hand. “And whoever uses this usually, I won’t be in their way either?“

Rose isn’t sure what to say to that for a moment.

“Whoever else…? No, no. This is for you, love.”

Amita looks up and blinks at her. Rose kicks herself internally and resists the urge to fidget. So much for being casual. They both have money though, right? This isn’t big deal. It’s just a cool… casual… grand romantic gesture. Between friends.

Amita smiles again, this one sweet and slow as cold honey. Rose’s heart maybe stops just a little.

“Thank you,” she says.

“And, you know, if you find somewhere else you’d like to set it up you can take it with you. I mean, I’m not going to use it.“ _Change the subject, change the subject._ “Anyway, how was that date?“ she blurts, because God is punishing her for some sort of past wickedness. Possibly that ‘thou shalt not steal’ bit.

Amita’s look grows sly and knowing. Because she’s not stupid. Rose has spent enough time with her to know that sometimes people think she is, think that because she’s nice and values niceness that that’s the same thing as being an idiot. People think the same thing about Rose and her silliness. If you’re a little quirky and a little forgetful, you’re either a genius or a moron—and of course, if your designs don’t sell, you can’t be a genius.

But Rose remembers how Amita was the only one besides Mrs. and Mrs. Mastermind who helped with the jewel exhibit. Rose knows she’s clever.

And she’s smirking at Rose now.

“It went okay,” Amita says, and _that’s_ how you sound cool and casual. She saunters forward and leans back against the corner of the marble tabletop. “I think I’d be better off with someone I had more in common with.”

“Makes sense,” says Rose, nodding.

They stand looking at one another for a moment.

“Giovanni‘s tonight at eight, then?“ Rose says, and Amita sighs.

“I’m so tired of pasta, honestly,” she says. “How about sushi?”

“It a date,” says Rose, and turns and sashays back to her current project before she can spoil it. Never too early to have prototypes for the spring line.

Then again, if she hurries she can have her coral piece ready by eight…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m riding this crazy train to the terminal y’all. Gimme your ships, or just pick two random ladies, and I’ll try to write at least a short thing. We’re shipping EVERYTHING here.


	3. Constance/Nineball

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If Constance wants to teach her how to toss three card Monte, who is Nineball to say no?

“I mean, most people use a shill,” Constance is saying. “But you don't gotta be good at anything to do it with a shill.” Her left thigh is pressed against Nineball's right where they sit on Lou’s faded couch, their heads close as they bend over the three battered playing cards lined up on the coffee table.

Constance puts a little bit of a hole in the mood by slurping her half-melted slushie practically in Nineball's ear, but the half-smile stays on her face somehow anyway.

“I mean, the shuffle is important,” she concedes, putting down her slushie on the table and beginning the rhythmic swapping of the bent cards. Nineball can't help but watch for the queen, even though she knows better. “See, you're dropping the cards from the top, but it looks like you're dropping them from the bottom. Mark ends up following the wrong card.”

“Coaster under the drink, Constance,” says Lou warningly as she walks by. Nineball grabs a coaster from the stack next to the ashtray and passes it over. Constance accepts it and picks up the offending drink, then wipes the table with her sleeve before putting the coaster back down.

This card lesson is not a lesson that Nineball requested. It didn't even come up organically in conversation. Nineball was just sitting on the couch with her computer and a blunt, and Constance walked up, hands in her jacket pockets, and matter-of-factly asked Nineball if she wanted to learn to toss three card Monte.

Constance is a little weird. Also, everyone here, killing time or plotting schemes or dealing with unresolved sexual tension in various alcoves of Lou’s lair, is a little weird. She hasn't spent much time with her but privately, Nineball thinks Constance might be kind of great. And passing up learning opportunities is what turns you old, right?

Constance slows down her shuffling, but Nineball can still barely see it. She pulls her left foot up onto the couch and props her chin on her knee. Nineball can play poker, sure, can even cheat at poker, but this is something completely different.

“Thing is, it's not really a game, right?” Constance explains as she continues to shuffle. “You can win a game. It's a magic trick. You always have to lose. David Copperfield can't, like, make the statue of liberty disappear most of the time. The mark in Monte never wins, ever.”

“So you use a shill?” says Nineball. Constance scoffs.

“A fucking amateur uses a shill,” she says, disdain in her voice. “The shill’s been hanging around talking it up, maybe making some fake wins. If the mark picks the right card by accident just because they're too dumb to follow where it's supposed to be, the shill puts a higher bet on the card and the tosser takes that one.”

“But you don't use a shill,” Nineball says, biting down on her smile.

Constance stops shuffling and picks up her slushie. She takes a sip and nods at the three cards on the table.

“Find the lady,” she instructs.

Nineball is too much of a New Yorker to even think about playing three card Monte, even before Constance’s explanation and even without a wager. She lifts her head from her knee and fixes Constance with a skeptical eye.

Constance stirs her slushie with the straw. “Go ahead,” she says. “I'll help you out.”

Nineball sighs and puffs on her joint, considering. She reaches towards the card on the left, not yet pointing, and cuts a look at Constance.

Constance slurps her slushie.

She rolls her eyes and extends her finger to the card. Constance flips it over, revealing the three of clubs. Then she peels the edge of the middle card up from the table, and Nineball sees the queen of hearts peeking out at her.

“Nah, it was this one,” Constance says. She flips Nineball's card back over and puts down her slushie again.

“Kay. Now find the lady.”

Nineball laughs in spite of herself and leans over to tap the center card. Constance picks up the right hand card and uses it to turn the center one over, and Nineball isn't really surprised to see that it's the eight of spades now.

“Thought you said you were going to help me out,” she says.

“Yeah, I lied,” Constance says, straight faced. She turns the card back over and flips it again. This time it is the queen of hearts. Nineball laughs again, out loud. It _is_ magic. She has a suspicion that three card Monte tossers on the street are always going to make her smile now.

Constance turns the card again, very slowly this time, and Nineball watches closely. 

“You're swapping one card for the other when you flip it,” Constance explains. “It's called a Mexican turn over.” She pauses. “I dunno if it's from Mexico, though.”

Even slowly, the switch of the cards is so smooth it's hard to spot at first. After another slow mo flip, Constance goes back to doing it fast. Nineball knows how it goes now, but the motion of Constance's nimble hands, pickpocket hands, are too fast and clean and Nineball loses it again instantly.

She's more than willing to admit they are very nice hands.

Nineball touches Constance's wrist. “Slower,” she says, her accent a low rumble. She pretends she doesn't notice the quick look Constance cuts her, just watches as the other woman turns the middle card over again and again--eight of spades, queen of hearts. Eight of spades, queen of hearts.

“How long did it take you to learn that?” Nineball can't help but ask. Constance's shoulders bunch in a shrug. Nineball nudges Constance's leg with hers. “I thought magicians weren't supposed to reveal the secrets to their tricks, anyway.”

Constance shrugs again. “I mean, you could google this.”

Nineball smirks around her joint and blows smoke over the coffee table. “Ah,” she says. “But if I learned this from google, how would you convince me to go home with you?”

Constance picks up her slushie and seems to give this question serious consideration. Nineball offers her blunt, and Constance trades her the slushie. Eh, why not? She takes a sip while Constance takes a drag.

“Probably the four burglars,” Constance says seriously, handing Nineball back her joint. Nineball passes her the slushie, which is much too sweet for her tastes. “It's a card trick with the jacks. Chicks love the four burglars.”

“I bet they do,” Nineball chuckles. Constance picks up the three cards and shuffles them idly. Nineball bumps their shoulders together.

“Show me the four burglars,” she says. Whether she signed up for this lesson or not initially, now she thinks she could probably sit here and watch Constance do card tricks all night.

Well. Not _all_ night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everything I know in life I learned from Wikipedia tbh
> 
> Still taking prompts/requests/ships for mini gifs for this fandom, y'all. fuck me up.


	4. Lou/Debbie, club AU

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's an extremely sexy brunette that comes into Lou's club and never dances. Lou takes that as a challenge.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This came out fluffy rather than sexy? but that's just how it be sometimes tbh. Also sorry it took so long, I got it three quarters done and it wasn't right so I had to let it cool lol

DJing at the Met club isn't going to make Lou rich anytime soon, but it's a decent side hustle. It's semi engaging, she gets free drinks, and even if there's not much you can do creatively with “Nineties Night,” there's something to be said for getting paid to watch beautiful women dance.

“That lady you always stare at just came in,” says a voice near her elbow, shouting a little over the music. Lou reaches down and accepts a bottle of beer from the bartender, Constance, and looks toward the door. Sure enough.

Or getting paid to watch beautiful women _not_ dance, as the case may be. She's here with the blonde friend tonight and a short Indian one Lou hasn't seen before--both pretty, and both eager to dance, if the little shimmy the shorter one is doing in the doorway is anything to go by. But it's the brunette Lou watches, taking their coats and laughing at something the blonde is saying.

She’s come to the club every weekend, in the company of these people and others, for about the last month. The friends she brings vary, but she's always among them, which is odd because she never dances. She's not the designated driver, but neither does she drink like an alcoholic only going out because it's more socially acceptable than staying in. She just sits at a table with the coats and purses and sips beers until her friends are ready to go home.

Lou thought briefly that the blonde might be her girlfriend, but these days she thinks probably not. A friendly ex, perhaps? She has, at least, never brought a man.

So Lou’s been paying attention. So what?

The brunette takes her place at the table and her friends head for the dance floor. Lou queues up some Pat Benatar because the blonde loves eighties even if Lou's boss would prefer she saved it for second Saturdays, and goes to the ladies’ room.

Before she comes out she checks her eyeliner and smooths down her hair, because as long as there's a mirror there, right? Her bangs need to be trimmed, but there's nothing for it right now. She knows she looks rakish with her bangs swept to one side anyway. She straightens her vest and heads back out.

She stops by the bar for some pretzels to go with her beer just as “Hit me with your best shot” comes on. Constance passes her the small bowl, but her eyebrows are raised and she's staring at something over Lou’s shoulder.

“What?” Lou asks, already turning around, and then she's staring too.

The brunette is dancing.

Sort of. She's on the dance floor and moving, at any rate. Lou watches, pretzels in hand, as the woman raises her fists in front of her face and hunches behind them at “put up your dukes,” bouncing on her toes like Muhammed Ali's white little sister with no talent whatsoever for boxing. She's also lip syncing. She's performing for her friends, who are laughing and clapping as she executes a slightly out of rhythm hip twist, her face deathly serious the whole time.

Lou may have had a little crush before. Now? She's fucked.

The song comes to an end and Lou's original playlist for the evening resumes. The brunette, unfortunately, sits back down.

Which obviously won't do it all.

Lou thinks maybe it was the eighties music that did the trick, so she fades out the Bruno Mars song that's come up next and puts on some Guns N’ Roses, which makes the blonde light up like Atlantic City but only results in the brunette ordering another beer.Maybe it's a phenomenon specific to Pat Benatar? She puts on “Heartbreaker” and gets no reaction except for a raised eyebrow from Constance over her drink shaker for playing the same artist almost back to back. Lou ignores her. The brunette does not dance.

She tries Cyndi Lauper and then Depeche Mode, second Saturdays be damned. She makes a quick age and personality judgement for what her target might've danced to in her bedroom when she was a kid, and puts on some Bad Company. It's hard to see at ap distance in the dim light of the club, but Lou thinks that might have gotten her toes tapping. It's difficult to say for sure.

After that, Lou can admit she maybe gets a little... frustrated. 

She goes even earlier with a Led Zeppelin, then some David Bowie. At one point, a frankly underappreciated Kylie Minogue EP sends half the club to order drinks instead of dance. There is very little appreciation in the room for Lou’s favorite Beck track either. She throws on Taylor Swift in a fit of pique, and the short lady emits a squeal that can be seen even if it can't be heard over the music. She rushes over to tug on the brunette's hands, and for a moment, Lou is seized with hope, but the woman laughs beautifully and shakes her head, and refuses to be pulled to her feet.

Putting on “Barbie Girl” next is probably Lou’s low point of the evening. Constance is staring at her.

A Kesha song delights the Indian girl again, but not enough for her to try persuading her friend to the floor again, so Lou switches it out for Nickelback out of spite, and follows it up with some Billy Joel that seems to delight about a third of the club and confuse everyone.

Just as she's deciding between Daft Punk and digging out some N’Sync from nineties night, she feels the vibration of someone knocking their knuckles on the DJ booth. Lou looks up from her laptop.

It's the brunette.

Lou takes her headphones off and sweeps her bangs to the side.

“You're embarrassing me,” the woman yells over “Movin’ Out.”

Lou isn't sure what to say to that. She raises an eyebrow that she hopes conveys her confusion without requiring her to form words, much less shout them to someone three feet away.

“I told my friend that the DJ was great here,” she says. “But you've been all over the map all night.” She crosses her arms in front of her, which has a very pleasant effect in that dress she's wearing. “Now she's going to think I just want you for your body.”

Lou feels a grin start to spread over her face. “You don't like Billy Joel?” she says.

“Oh fuck off, everyone likes Billy Joel,” the woman shouts irritably. “He's the piano man.”

“But you don't find him appropriate for a club environment.”

“Right.”

Lou takes a moment, pretending to consider this. “If I'm such a good DJ, why don't you ever dance?” 

Now it's the other woman's turn to look taken aback for a moment. 

“I danced tonight,” she says. Her crossed arms tighten a little bit defensively, which Lou considers a cosmic reward for honesty and communication.

“Exactly,” Lou shouts. “I thought my luck had changed. I've been trying everything I can think of to get you back out there.”

Now the woman is smiling too.

“You thought I'd dance to Nickelback?” she says.

“No,” replies Lou. “That was to punish you.”

One side of the woman's mouth bunches up and she looks away. Lou thinks it might count as a laugh.

“I'm Debbie,” the woman yells, as Billy informs them that you should never argue with a crazy mi-mi-mind.

“I'm Lou,” Lou says. “So what do I have to do?”

“To get me to dance, or to get my number?” Debbie replies.

“Both.”

One corner of Debbie's mouth start to curl upward forebodingly.

“Play the Electric Boogie,” she shouts.

Lou stares at her.

“Are you serious?” Debbie nods, her expression grave. “This isn't some kind of fucking white middle class wedding reception,” Lou says.

Debbie smiles serenely. “Could have fooled me,” she replies.

Lou looks at her. Debbie looks back at Lou. On the speakers, Billy Joel is wrapping it up.

Lou cues up the electric side.

Debbie's friends, who are over at the bar doing something that looks uncomfortably like gossiping with Constance, rush over to the dance floor, excited, as soon as it starts up. Debbie's friends are enormous fucking squares. Debbie doesn't seem to be bothered by this.

Instead she backs out onto the dance floor, not breaking eye contact with Lou, who feels the beginnings of what she suspects with horror might be a case of the giggles. Debbie, stonefaced, raises a beckoning finger in front of her face and curls it in Lou’s direction, which, no. Not a chance. It's embarrassing enough just sitting in this booth being the DJ who's playing the song.

Debbie beckons again.

Aw, Hell.

Lou takes her headphones off from around her neck and comes down, shaking her head and smiling as Debbie steps seamlessly into the electric slide. Her friends are improvising something that looks kind of like a line dance but mostly not, and over at the bar Constance is giving Lou a look that demands a full explanation at a later date. But in front of her Debbie is indeed pumping like a matic and moving like electric, and Lou is absolutely, totally, comprehensively fucked.

She finds she doesn't mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't @ me about ~~my~~ Lou's terrible DJing okay _she's a woman in love_ and can't be held responsible for her actions
> 
> Edit: Tatea14, who gave me the prompt for this one, drew me an art of it <3 http://imgivingyouthedays.tumblr.com/post/178233921721/ive-had-an-idea-in-my-head-for-ages-and-the


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